It has been commonplace for many years to find discrete magazines adapted to receive and hold in stacked relation a plurality of cartridges to be fed into the chamber of a semi-automatic handgun, or pistol. Such magazines are generally secured, in a releasable manner, within a chamber provided in the grip portion of the frame. The magazine is releasably secured therein by a catch mechanism and may be released by actuation of a button to remove the magazine from the gun, such as after all of the cartridges have been fired. The magazine may then be reloaded, or replaced with a preloaded magazine, for insertion into the magazine chamber of the pistol.
Typically, such magazine catches comprises a spring-loaded release button which protrudes from the left side of the grip for right-handed shooters, or from both sides in some ambidextrous models, as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,899,476 assigned to the same assignee as this application. Such placement of the actuator or release button is important to enable the shooter to release the magazine from the pistol quickly using the thumb of the shooting hand after the last round has been fired. It is also important that the actuator be located or accessible to the shooter without requiring a substantial change, or release of one's grip on the pistol.
The major advantage of the disposition of the above discussed actuator is that persons with reasonable dexterity will be able to eject the empty magazine with the shooting hand, reinsert a preloaded magazine, using the non-shooting and resume firing relatively quickly and easily. Given that most shooters who are likely to require such manipulative skills include law enforcement officers, military personnel and firearms contestants, routinely carry one or more preloaded spare magazines and have the occasional practice session at the shooting range. It is no surprise to learn that such shooters are capable of executing a "mag shift" and be ready to resume firing in a matter of seconds.
A disadvantage associated with such conventional arrangements is that the placement of the catch release may be inconvenient for many users. Indeed, shooters having other than average size hands may not be able to operate the catch without repositioning the shooting hand on the grip. These users must, therefore, release their grip of the pistol and/or rotate their shooting hand relative to the pistol grip in order to manipulate the catch with their thumb. This manipulation is cumbersome and adds to the time during which the shooter is unable to fire the weapon. While minimizing such time loss may be important to a good score in competitive shooting, in law enforcement situations, if not overcome, it could pose a potentially deadly situation.
Another disadvantage of the prior art construction is that it comprises a number of discrete components, each of which require individual manufacture and subsequent assembly. In addition, a lateral bore must be provided in the frame for receiving the actuator button. As a result of these numerous operations, the cost of manufacture of such a multi-component construction is relatively high.
One type of magazine catch mechanism which, at least in part, attempts to remedy the aforementioned disadvantages is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,155,187. That patent discloses a magazine catch comprising a snap-type interlock in which a lower portion of each magazine side wall is punched out or cut to provide a tongue 36 which is knurled, or ribbed tab 38 at its free bottom end. The tabs are spaced outward of the walls of the magazine. Each tongue has straight bottom edges which are engageable with edges of cutouts disposed in the side walls 46 and 47 of the grip portion of the frame. Accordingly, when the magazine is inserted into the grip, the tongues are cammed inwardly by the inner surface of the side walls of the grip until the magazine is fully inserted, whereupon the edges of the tongue will spring outwardly to engage the edges of the cutouts and secure the magazine in-place in the gun. The magazine can be released by squeezing the tabs inwardly towards one another. An advantage to this construction is that the shooter is able to remove an empty magazine entirely with the non-shooting hand. The shooting hand can, therefore, remain generally in its firing grip on the gun during reloading.
Although the latter configuration offers advantages over the previously-referenced prior art, it is unfortunately not without its own disadvantages. In particular, foreign particles, such as dirt, mud or gravel may become lodged in the exposed gap between the free-ends of the tabs and the magazine tube and thereby prevent the user from depressing the tabs for removing the magazine for reloading. Dirty or muddy conditions are commonly encountered by military and law enforcement personnel in the field and as a result, the instances of weapon failure may be unacceptably high.